What We Believe

The Bible: The Bible is the complete written Word of God, consisting of sixty-six books in the Old and New Testaments and was originally given by God through verbal/plenary inspiration in all parts and is therefore wholly without error (II Tim. 3:16-17, II Pet. 1:19-21).

The Trinity of God: The one true God exists eternally as three persons–the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (Mark 12:29-30, Matt. 28:19, II Cor. 13:14, Titus 3:4-7).

Jesus Christ: Jesus Christ is God manifested in the flesh by virgin birth. He lived a sinless life, died for our sins, bodily arose from the dead, ascended into heaven, is presently preparing a place for us as our high priest and is coming again (John 1:1, 14:29; Matt. 1:18-23; Heb. 4:15; I Pet. 3:18; I Cor. 15:3-19).

The Holy Spirit: The Holy Spirit is the third Person of the Trinity. He convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). At salvation, the Holy Spirit causes spiritual rebirth, empowers, indwells, seals, bestows gifts, and baptizes the believer into the Body of Christ (Rom. 8:9; I Cor. 2:12, 3:16, 12:11, 13). He continues to sanctify, guide and teach through the written Word of God, and fill the believer who walks in obedience to the Word (Acts 5:3-4; John 3:5; Rom. 8:9; Eph. 4:30; I Cor. 6:11, 19; Rom. 8:14; John 14:16-17; Eph. 5:18-21).

A note regarding The Gifts of the Holy Spirit. There are three categories of spiritual gifts in the New Testament; Sign gifts, speaking gifts, and serving gifts. It appears that as the church matured, the sign gifts decreased and what was left were the other two types of spiritual gifts; Speaking gifts and serving gifts are the only two types of gifts bestowed upon the Church today (1st Peter 4:10-11).

The sign gifts (primarily, speaking in tongues, the interpretation of tongues and apostolic miracles) are only mentioned in Acts 2 and 1 Corinthians 12-14, a letter that was written around AD 54. Tongues are not mentioned again in Scripture and are not evidenced again in Church history.

In Paul’s letter to the Romans which was written several years later (around AD 58) he doesn’t mention sign gifts. Likewise, the letter to the Ephesians was written about AD 61-63, but when Paul mentions gifts in Ephesians he doesn’t include the sign gifts. Finally, 1st Peter was written even later, around AD 66. and the sign gifts were not mentioned there either.

We believe tongues were a known language, spoken by those who did not know the language to those who did.

We believe tongues were a sign for the unbelieving Jews (1 Cor. 14:22), and that they have ceased (1 Cor. 13:8).

Man: Man was supernaturally created in the image of God on the 6th 24-hour day of the creation week and is not a product of evolution. Man chose to sin and disobey God, resulting in spiritual death and all mankind is now sinful by nature and practice, unable to save himself from his sins (Gen. 1:26-28, 2:7, 3:1-24; Rom. 3:23, 5:12; Eph. 2:3).

Salvation: Eternal life is received as the gift of God by His grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as the only way to eternal life. There are no good deeds or works involved. (Rom. 6:23, Eph. 2:8-9, John 14:6, I Pet. 1:18-21, John 3:16, John 6:47).

The Church: All believers from Pentecost to the Rapture of the Church are members of the Body of Christ with Christ as the Head. This is manifest on earth in local churches where believers should assemble for teaching, fellowship, prayer and equipping for ministry (I Cor. 1:2; Col. 1:18, 24, 3:11; Heb. 10:25; Eph. 4:11-18; Gal. 6:10).

Ordinances: The observance of the biblical church practices of:

1. Baptism (of believers) by triune immersion in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 28:18-20).

Angels: God created all angels. Some followed the angel Satan the ruler of demons in his prideful rebellion against God and became demonic adversaries of God and His people. These angels are limited by God’s omnipotence and await final incarceration in the Lake of Fire. Other angels remained faithful to God and are God’s ministering spirits to His people. Humans do not become angels when they die. (Gen. 1:1, Ex.10:11, Ps.33:6; Rev.12:3-4; Matt.12:23-27; Job 2:1-2; Rev. 20:10; Matt. 25:41; Heb. 1:13- 14).

The Rapture of the Church and Second Coming of Jesus Christ: The personal, visible, and imminent return of Christ to remove His Church from the earth before The Day of the Lord (I Thess. 4:16-17; I Thess. 1:10, Rev. 3:10). After the Tribulation Jesus Christ will descend to establish his Millennial Kingdom upon the earth (Rev. 20:1-6).

Future Life: All believers shall live eternally with God in a “New Heaven and Earth.” Upon physical death, they go immediately to be with Christ and are given some sort of body (2 Corinthians 5:1-3) as they await the resurrection of their earthly body at Christ’s coming. All unbelievers, upon physical death, go immediately to Hades and await the bodily resurrection at the Great White Throne Judgment. At that time, they will be cast into the Lake of Fire for eternal punishment (Matt. 25:46; John 3:16, 5:24, 10:27-29; II Cor. 5:8; I Thess. 4:13-18; Jude 23-24; Luke 16:19-31; Rev. 20:11-15).

The Christian Life: In addition to being the body of Christ (Ephesians 4:4), and Ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20), Christians are a royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:9) and are to live a life of righteousness and good works, be separated unto God from worldliness, maintain a godly home, settle differences with believers in the church, avoid living in the flesh, exhibit the fruit and fullness of the Spirit, fulfill the Great Commission in making disciples of all nations, and devote themselves to prayer and Bible study (Phil. 4:6; I Thess. 5:17-18; Eph. 6:18; II Tim. 2:15, 3:16-17; Rom. 12:1-2; Eph. 2:8-10, 5:22, 6:4; I Cor. 6:1-8; Gal. 5:16-23; Eph. 5:18-20; I Pet. 4:10-11; Matt. 28:19-20; Acts 1:8).

A note regarding marriage. We believe marriage was instituted by God as a holy union between only one man and one woman for life. We do not recognize so-called same sex marriage. Genesis 1:27; 2:18,22-23; Malachi 2:15-16; Matthew 19:4-6; Mark 10:6-9).